Highlights of work report of China's Supreme People's Court

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BEIJING, March 10 -- China's chief justice Zhou Qiang, president of the Supreme People's Court (SPC), delivered a report on the work of the SPC on Monday to the second session of the 12th National People's Congress.

Following are highlights of Zhou's report:

WORK IN 2013

-- The SPC heard 11,016 cases of various types, up 3.2 percent over 2012, and concluded 9,716 cases, up 1.6 percent. Local courts at various levels heard more than 14.21 million cases of various types, up 7.4 percent over 2012, and concluded 12.95 million cases, up 4.4 percent.

-- Chinese courts concluded 250,000 cases of severe crimes, including homicide, kidnapping, robbery, planting bombs, organized crime and human trafficking. A total of 325,000 criminals involved in these cases were convicted and punished.

-- About 99,000 people were convicted of drug-related crimes.

-- The SPC issued a judicial explanation on the criminal cases of spreading harmful rumors and intentionally inciting unrest.

-- The SPC issued a judicial explanation on the criminal cases of defamation on Internet.

-- Chinese courts convicted and punished 31,000 criminals in 29,000 cases of embezzlement, bribery and breach of duty, including several serious cases such as Bo Xilai, former party chief of Chongqing Municipality, and Liu Zhijun, former minister of railways.

-- Chinese courts acquitted 825 people for lack of evidence and reasonable doubts last year.

-- Chinese courts closed 121,000 administrative cases in first trials and 2,045 cases of seeking state compensation involving 87 million yuan (14 million U.S. dollars).

-- Courts of all levels received about 539,000 visits from petitioners last year, 10.2 percent fewer than 2012.

-- The SPC set up a national database of court order defaulters and worked with several government departments to punish 72,000 defaulters. About 20 percent of defaulters fulfilled their duties on their own.

-- About 45,000 trial proceedings were published on public media, including several high-profile ones such as the trial of Bo Xilai.

-- The SPC opened a website to publish judgement documents. So far about 3,900 SPC judgements and 1.65 million ones from local courts have been published.

-- The SPC opened official accounts on Sina Weibo and WeChat, two of the country's leading social media tools.

-- Citizen jurors took part in trials of 1.7 million cases, which accounted for 73.2 percent of all first-trial cases.

-- A total of 381 judges and court staff were caught misusing their power and violating disciplines and laws, 101 of whom were prosecuted.

WHAT TO DO IN 2014

-- The SPC will put up a severe fight against crimes harming national security, including terrorism.

-- The SPC will step up the efforts against corruption and maintain high-handed posture on embezzlement, bribery and breach of duty.

-- The SPC will properly handle disputes occurring in the process of reforms in line with laws.

-- The SPC will deepen judicial reform by improving transparency and exploring a way to set up a jurisdiction system of courts that is not completely based on administrative divisions.

-- The SPC will strictly implement the rules that hold judges responsible for wrong verdicts.